Question About PC / Specialty Dining Rooms

[jeanaa]

I have a question about the Specialty Dining Rooms and Personal Choice Dining. I am planning to book Traditional dining, since I am traveling solo, and want to enjoy dinner with other guests, but I also would like to try a few of the specialty dining rooms. Is there an additional fee for these dining rooms if you have Traditional as opposed to Personal Choice? Or can anyone go for the same price? I am traveling on the Diamond Princess.
Thanks.

[Toto2Kansas]

There is a $15 Charge per person for the Sterling Steakhouse and a $25 charge per person for Sabatinis no matter what dining option you choose. The buffet is another althernate open in the evenings and there is no charge for this.

[Coral]

The Diamond and Sapphire Princess are different from the other ships.

It is my understanding that if you are in the Traditional dining room (named International dining room) - they rotate the menus from the 4 different speciality dining rooms (Pacific Moon, Sterling, Vivaldi and Sante Fe) in your dining room so there is no need to leave the Traditional dining room to try the other menus. There are no charges on this ship for the Pacific Moon, Sterling, Vivaldi and Santa Fe dining rooms.

There is a speciality restaurant on the ship called Sabitini's which costs $25 per person for the meal.

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On ships other then Diamond and Sapphire - there is a $15 charge for Sterling Steakhouse (which is different the Diamond and Sapphire Sterling's restaurant) and on all the ships - there is a charge for Sabitinis.

[Solo Cruiser]

Jeanaa:

Traveling alone does not mean that you must use traditional dining seatings or be relegated to eating alone. I have booked the Anytime Dining option on both cruises and am always seated with tables of very congenial people. Now it's a different group of people every night (unless I make reservations with some folks on more than one occasion). The PC dining options on the Diamond and Sapphire sound really exciting.

[CruisJack]

[quote name='jeanaa']I have a question about the Specialty Dining Rooms and Personal Choice Dining. I am planning to book Traditional dining, since I am traveling solo, and want to enjoy dinner with other guests, but I also would like to try a few of the specialty dining rooms. Is there an additional fee for these dining rooms if you have Traditional as opposed to Personal Choice? Or can anyone go for the same price? I am traveling on the Diamond Princess.
Thanks.[/QUOTE]

Ahoy Jeanaa :-)
Here is a comprehensive explanation of Anytime Dining aboard Princess
ships contained in a review by Suzy Cruisy.

The Dining

I realize some folks think cruising is ALL about the food, but its not. I’d say maybe 80% ;) is a better guess. For those new to Princess, or cruising, I’ll explain Princess dining in general. Then I’ll elaborate in the Diamond Princess dining experience, how its different, and just THE BEST.

On most cruiselines, the main dining choices are two “fixed” seatings. You are either assigned early or late traditional fixed seating. In this traditional dining experience, you would sit at the same table, with the same dining companions, with the same waiters, at exactly the same time every night of the cruise. Cruises were like this because of the large number of folks that needed to be fed, and it was the most efficient to feed them “en masse”.

On Princess, you can choose “traditional” or “Anytime Dining” as part of their “Personal Choice Cruising” concept. With Anytime Dining, your dining is much more flexible, even though you will order off the same menu as those folks that are in the traditional dining room. (The menu changes every night, usually with a “theme”, so you don’t see the same stuff twice during your cruise unless it’s a real long one.)

Basically, Anytime Dining is like walking up to a restaurant at home. You walk up when you want during the hours they are open (usually 5:30 – 9:00pm), tell them how many are in your party, and they seat you as space becomes available. If you go during the “peak” hour of 7-8pm, then you might have to wait for a table. If you go much earlier or later, you can usually get seated right away. Also, just like at home, you can make a reservation if you are sure in advance that you want to eat at a particular time, at a specific table, or with a specific waiter.

How the Diamond (and its sister Sapphire) are different: The Anytime Dining experience on Diamond has been taken to ANOTHER level. There is not just one, or two, Anytime dining rooms that have that evening’s menu.. but FOUR uniquely-themed dining rooms. Now, its REALLY like a restaurant. The four themes are Southwestern, Asian, Italian and American Steakhouse. When you walk into one of these, you will have not only the nightly menu placed in front of you, but also a supplemental menu that has selections based upon the “theme” of the dining room you are sitting in. You can order off both, mix and match, etc!

The only “catch” is that its more important now to choose to make reservations. Each of the four themed dining rooms are small, so they fit a very limited number of people at once. I found on my short cruise that the American Steakhouse dining room (Sterling) was so sold out it didn’t even take walk-ups.

Also of note is that the four Anytime Dining rooms are laid out exactly the same and have only ONE large, 10-person table. There are quite a few 4 and 6 person tables, and LOTS of tables for two against the wall.

Also, if you choose traditional dining on your Diamond or Sapphire Princess cruise, you won’t feel left out either. They rotate the special dining room menus in the traditional dining room as well, so the folks that enjoy the traditional experience can enjoy the specialty dishes.

Other dining options: Princess has 24-hour room service, and buffet, if you don’t want to have dinner in the main dining rooms.

They also have an Italian restaurant called “Sabatini’s” that you can choose to pay a service charge to have either lunch or dinner in. The courses keep coming in here, and the very best waiters and waitresses are in here.

For an even more casual dining experience, they have a hamburger grill and pizza in the afternoon out by one of the pools. They also have “Scoops”, a premium ice cream bar that has an extra service fee (that I always refuse to partake in). Free ice cream is available in the buffet in the afternoons.

Breakfast, lunch, and “high tea” are always available in one of the main dining rooms each day also.

You will be given a “Continental Stateroom Breakfast” door hanger on your first day. You can make selections from here and hang it on your door at night and get your breakfast delivered in the morning. If you don’t get a door hanger the second day, ask. Also, you can order whatever you want on the door hanger, not just what is pre-printed. Just write what you want in the margin, but remember to write EVERYTHING you need. For example, if you order pancakes, remember to also order syrup.

[jeanaa]

Thanks, everyone, for taking the time to help me out.
Regards,
Jeana

[jeanaa]

Solo Cruiser,
Several people have advised me against booking Anytime Dining - I am by nature an introvert, and I always assumed people who book Anytime Dining are already traveling with their dining buddies, but I really did like the option of eating when it made best sense for me. Since it sounds like you have done both Traditional and Anytime Dining (as a solo cruiser?), do you have a preference? Are there any drawbacks to either? Thanks.

[catmand]

[font=Comic Sans MS]Jeanaa, I would guess it would be difficult to change a lifetime personality overnight. You will find 97.5% of the people you run into on the ship will be folks making conversations easy. 2% are kids and the other .5% are people you wouldn't want to talk with anyway. I doubt you will be unlucky enough to bump into those 13.5 people anyway and beside, they usually stick to themselves.[/font]
[font=Comic Sans MS][/font]
[font=Comic Sans MS]It is so easy to engage in conversation on the ship, all it usually takes is a smile and a hello. As you have read, traditional will seat you at the same table, same people every night, but why limit yourself to just those folks, whomever they are?[/font]
[font=Comic Sans MS][/font]
[font=Comic Sans MS]Hope you have a great time, go anytime dining, you will be fine![/font]

[Solo Cruiser]

Jeanaa:

My cruising experience is limited to 2 cruises and I have opted for anytime dining on both of them. I agree with Catmand that you will find really friendly people at dinner time and the conversation flows freely. Because I travel alone I like to meet as many people as I can. Anytime dining just gives you a wider range of people to make new friends from.